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12/15/2015Theater: Bootycandy Is Delicious, Frustrating Fun | Evernote Web
https://www.evernote.com/Home.action#n=8bdf705c-aa74-431a-8fe8-14c67a753c49&ses=4&sh=2&sds=5&1/4Theater: Bootycandy Is Delicious, Frustrating FunTheater: Bootycandy Is Delicious, Frustrating FunBOOTYCANDY *** out of **** PLAYWRIGHTS HORIZONSBootycandy -- a series of scathingly funny and sometimes disturbingly raw set pieces -- has the vital messinessand ping-ponging energy of a first play. That's both compliment and complaint since Bootycandy is not writer-director Robert O'Hara's debut as an author. It's often hilarious and deeply serious at the same time, a bracingcombination that immediately makes O'Hara a playwright whose work I won't want to miss. But Bootycandy is sogood in parts that it's frustrating to see what might easily have become a great play sprawling out into simply agood one. Still, the excellent cast and high humor make Bootycandy worth your time.While it's tempting to emphasize the sketch aspect of the show, most of the pieces build on the story of Sutter, agay kid growing up in a world that doesn't quite know what to think of a young black boy who likes boys. Theyhave a cumulative impact and are generally the strongest element of the show. In the first scene, Sutter (theexcellent Phillip James Brannon) is asking his mom (the very funny Jessica Frances Dukes) the meaning ofwords like "period" and "blow job" while getting ready to go shopping with her.Later scenes show Sutter -- in full-on Michael jackson regalia right down to one sparkly glove -- telling hisparents a man followed him home from the library. What did you do, they attacked, soon coming up with a litanyof things Sutter should do or not do (play sports, bend his knees when picking things up, avoid performing inmusicals) that silently amounts to "not be so gay."And in one of the show's freshest and most off-kilter scenes, Sutter is in a bar with a drunken childhood friend(Jesse Pennington) who has married his sister, describing what he'd like to do with him sexually. It's sexy, funny,amusing and disturbing all at once. A later scene in which Sutter and a friend play along with another drunkenwhite man before pushing towards a violent climax is less convincing but equally adept at keeping the audienceoff balance.Interspersed among these tales of Sutter come other, less specific sketches. Whether funny or not, they distractfrom the fascinating story at hand and ultimately detract from the power of Bootycandy. "Dreamin' in Church" isan obvious but amusing sketch about what might happen if the preacher addressed rumors about the sexualproclivities of the boys in the choir with righteous indignation and some high heels. Lance Coadie Williams -- theshow's secret weapon as he portrays so many varied roles with such razor precision -- elevates the stereotypeof a sermonizing man of the cloth with his gleeful attack. Williams is also wonderful as Sutter's low-key stepdad,drag queen pal and aging grandmother.While "Dreamin' In Church" and another hilarious one with four women talking on the phone are funny on theirown, the less germane set pieces ultimately prove detrimental. A skit about a roundtable of black playwrightshas one modest joke (a clueless moderator) and the meta realization that some of the (lesser) sketches aresupposedly written by the four playwrights depicted, including a goes-nowhere sketch about a guy talking awould-be mugger into leaving him alone. Least amusing of all is an "un-commitment" ceremony between twowomen that drags on and on and should obviously have been cut, despite the fact that the talented women ofthe show Benja Kay Thomas and Dukes as the couple Genitalia and Intifada give their all and do in fact squeezesome laughs out of it. The jokey names alone show how unworthy this piece is of O'Hara's talented mind.
12/15/2015Theater: Bootycandy Is Delicious, Frustrating Fun | Evernote Web
https://www.evernote.com/Home.action#n=8bdf705c-aa74-431a-8fe8-14c67a753c49&ses=4&sh=2&sds=5&2/4Similarly, the meta device of the playwright's roundtable and even worse the tired conceit of stopping the showwhile the actors confront the "playwright" over his choices feel uninteresting.On the other hand, O'Hara has great taste in collaborators. The cast is truly excellent from top to bottom, thoughBrannon's subtle work may get unfairly overshadowed by the scene-stealing hilarity offered up to the rest. ClintRamos devised and excellent turntable set and great costumes that manage to be funny without being jokey.Other tech elements are superior as well, especially the hair and makeup of Dave Bova that works with theactors so well I almost expected more than five actors to come out and take a bow at the end.Those bows are well deserved. It's simply that the core of Bootycandy is so fresh and vital, so delicious that wecan't be bothered with anything less. Neither should O'Hara.THEATER OF 2014Beautiful: The Carole King Musical ***Rodney King *** Hard Times ** 1/2 Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead ** I Could Say More * The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner ** Machinal *** Outside Mullingar *** A Man's A Man * 1/2 The Tribute Artist ** 1/2 Transport ** Prince Igor at the Met ** The Bridges Of Madison County ** 1/2 Kung Fu (at Signature) ** Stage Kiss *** Satchmo At The Waldorf *** Antony and Cleopatra at the Public ** All The Way ** 1/2 The Open House (Will Eno at Signature) ** 1/2 Wozzeck (at Met w Deborah Voigt and Thomas Hampson and Simon O'Neill) Hand To God *** Tales From Red Vienna ** Appropriate (at Signature) * Rocky * 1/2 Aladdin *** Mothers And Sons ** Les Miserables *** 1/2 Breathing Time * 1/2 Cirque Du Soleil's Amaluna * 1/2 Heathers The Musical * 1/2 Red Velvet, at St. Ann's Warehouse *** Broadway By The Year 1940-1964 *** 1/2 A Second Chance ** Guys And Dolls *** 1/2 If/Then * 1/2 The Threepenny Opera * 1/2
https://www.evernote.com/Home.action#n=8bdf705c-aa74-431a-8fe8-14c67a753c49&ses=4&sh=2&sds=5&1/4Theater: Bootycandy Is Delicious, Frustrating FunTheater: Bootycandy Is Delicious, Frustrating FunBOOTYCANDY *** out of **** PLAYWRIGHTS HORIZONSBootycandy -- a series of scathingly funny and sometimes disturbingly raw set pieces -- has the vital messinessand ping-ponging energy of a first play. That's both compliment and complaint since Bootycandy is not writer-director Robert O'Hara's debut as an author. It's often hilarious and deeply serious at the same time, a bracingcombination that immediately makes O'Hara a playwright whose work I won't want to miss. But Bootycandy is sogood in parts that it's frustrating to see what might easily have become a great play sprawling out into simply agood one. Still, the excellent cast and high humor make Bootycandy worth your time.While it's tempting to emphasize the sketch aspect of the show, most of the pieces build on the story of Sutter, agay kid growing up in a world that doesn't quite know what to think of a young black boy who likes boys. Theyhave a cumulative impact and are generally the strongest element of the show. In the first scene, Sutter (theexcellent Phillip James Brannon) is asking his mom (the very funny Jessica Frances Dukes) the meaning ofwords like "period" and "blow job" while getting ready to go shopping with her.Later scenes show Sutter -- in full-on Michael jackson regalia right down to one sparkly glove -- telling hisparents a man followed him home from the library. What did you do, they attacked, soon coming up with a litanyof things Sutter should do or not do (play sports, bend his knees when picking things up, avoid performing inmusicals) that silently amounts to "not be so gay."And in one of the show's freshest and most off-kilter scenes, Sutter is in a bar with a drunken childhood friend(Jesse Pennington) who has married his sister, describing what he'd like to do with him sexually. It's sexy, funny,amusing and disturbing all at once. A later scene in which Sutter and a friend play along with another drunkenwhite man before pushing towards a violent climax is less convincing but equally adept at keeping the audienceoff balance.Interspersed among these tales of Sutter come other, less specific sketches. Whether funny or not, they distractfrom the fascinating story at hand and ultimately detract from the power of Bootycandy. "Dreamin' in Church" isan obvious but amusing sketch about what might happen if the preacher addressed rumors about the sexualproclivities of the boys in the choir with righteous indignation and some high heels. Lance Coadie Williams -- theshow's secret weapon as he portrays so many varied roles with such razor precision -- elevates the stereotypeof a sermonizing man of the cloth with his gleeful attack. Williams is also wonderful as Sutter's low-key stepdad,drag queen pal and aging grandmother.While "Dreamin' In Church" and another hilarious one with four women talking on the phone are funny on theirown, the less germane set pieces ultimately prove detrimental. A skit about a roundtable of black playwrightshas one modest joke (a clueless moderator) and the meta realization that some of the (lesser) sketches aresupposedly written by the four playwrights depicted, including a goes-nowhere sketch about a guy talking awould-be mugger into leaving him alone. Least amusing of all is an "un-commitment" ceremony between twowomen that drags on and on and should obviously have been cut, despite the fact that the talented women ofthe show Benja Kay Thomas and Dukes as the couple Genitalia and Intifada give their all and do in fact squeezesome laughs out of it. The jokey names alone show how unworthy this piece is of O'Hara's talented mind.
12/15/2015Theater: Bootycandy Is Delicious, Frustrating Fun | Evernote Web
https://www.evernote.com/Home.action#n=8bdf705c-aa74-431a-8fe8-14c67a753c49&ses=4&sh=2&sds=5&2/4Similarly, the meta device of the playwright's roundtable and even worse the tired conceit of stopping the showwhile the actors confront the "playwright" over his choices feel uninteresting.On the other hand, O'Hara has great taste in collaborators. The cast is truly excellent from top to bottom, thoughBrannon's subtle work may get unfairly overshadowed by the scene-stealing hilarity offered up to the rest. ClintRamos devised and excellent turntable set and great costumes that manage to be funny without being jokey.Other tech elements are superior as well, especially the hair and makeup of Dave Bova that works with theactors so well I almost expected more than five actors to come out and take a bow at the end.Those bows are well deserved. It's simply that the core of Bootycandy is so fresh and vital, so delicious that wecan't be bothered with anything less. Neither should O'Hara.THEATER OF 2014Beautiful: The Carole King Musical ***Rodney King *** Hard Times ** 1/2 Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead ** I Could Say More * The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner ** Machinal *** Outside Mullingar *** A Man's A Man * 1/2 The Tribute Artist ** 1/2 Transport ** Prince Igor at the Met ** The Bridges Of Madison County ** 1/2 Kung Fu (at Signature) ** Stage Kiss *** Satchmo At The Waldorf *** Antony and Cleopatra at the Public ** All The Way ** 1/2 The Open House (Will Eno at Signature) ** 1/2 Wozzeck (at Met w Deborah Voigt and Thomas Hampson and Simon O'Neill) Hand To God *** Tales From Red Vienna ** Appropriate (at Signature) * Rocky * 1/2 Aladdin *** Mothers And Sons ** Les Miserables *** 1/2 Breathing Time * 1/2 Cirque Du Soleil's Amaluna * 1/2 Heathers The Musical * 1/2 Red Velvet, at St. Ann's Warehouse *** Broadway By The Year 1940-1964 *** 1/2 A Second Chance ** Guys And Dolls *** 1/2 If/Then * 1/2 The Threepenny Opera * 1/2